Garland: A Knight's Fall
by PhoenixKnight13
Summary: How did the once noble knight Garland fall into darkness? What was he like in his youth? When did he first take up his sword? His mysterious past, which has only been hinted at will finally be revealed.


**Garland: A Knight's Fall**

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 **Disclaimer:** This is a short one-shot fanfic based on the Final Fantasy I and Dissida: Final Fantasy games. This is what I think could have been going through the mind of the character Garland, just after he was defeated near the beginning of Final Fantasy I.

All Final Fantasy characters, places and everything else related mentioned are the property of © Square-Enix.

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Though his life was quickly beginning to wane, and the world was beginning to grow dim. Garland could hear the princess's quiet voice echoing through his mind, when he first met her face-to-face:

 _"Sir Knight, are you all right?"_

And he dreamed a memory long past...

 _A mysterious feral beast had made a diet of the equines that used to be common in the area of a small peaceful village, the home of Garland's youth. Once the horse population started to dwindle, it went after the other livestock... and their owners._

 _The beast's reign of terror lasted for months. The behemoth had to be destroyed, but if it was to be defeated, the village might have to sacrifice its greatest warrior._

 _The young Garland swiftly volunteered to face the monster. The village elder agreed to let Garland take the sword and armor, the most precious treasure in the entire village, and face it alone. The blade was embodied great strength, and its power was tremendous._

 _Garland marched into the monsters den alone, armed only with his mighty sword._ _When he at last came face-to-face with the beast, he found it possessed a regal mane, two bull-like horns and red eyes of the deepest crimson._

 _The beast let out a mighty roar and stepped forward._

 _"I challenge you to battle." Garland challenged it._

 _The Behemoth looked shocked for a moment, but soon regained it's composure. It looked ready to battle, snarling and sptting and at the ground defiantly._

 _Garland launched himself at the beast._

 _The battle that ensued was one for the ages. Although he had little training, Garland was able to wield his mighty blade against the beast's great strength._

 _Immune to its evil magic, he eventually ran the Behemoth through with his enchanted sword. The beast collapsed to the ground and let out one last pathetic whimper before it died._

 _Sadly, only after his enemy fell and the battle finally won did the man realize the price for his victory. His village and its people had been completely decimated in the battle._

 _With no family and no home Garland elected to wonder to wilderness slaying monsters. He continued on this path for years until he'd become weary of battle._

 _Then one day, as he was traveling he was accosted by a pack of wolves. At first he readied his blade and fought them, defeating all with such ease that it seemed almost laughable to actually slay them. It was at that moment that he came to the conclusion that his life held no meaning. He had been fighting for so long that there didn't seem to be a point anymore, he had no real purpose. While he contemplated this, the wolves stepped up their attacks. But instead of fighting back, Garland began to lose focus and the beasts were able to injure him with one successful blow after another._

 _Not too far away a young girl was lazily walking through the fields while playing a song on a lute she was carrying, a rock she'd absent mindedly kicked skidded across the short green grass and landed with a thud against a tree. She paused in her playing, she then decide to take a moment to sit beneath the tree._

 _The tree was large and shaded her from the sun well. The grass was ankle high and crystal clear streams flowed freely. Bushes and bundles of berries dotted the valley and a small waterfall was churning a little ways from her, keeping the stream going._

 _She sat beneath the tree and began to play her lute. A soft sweet melody issued from it, it started out low and soft but grew higher and more calming as she played._

 _A cry sounded throughout the area. It was a cry of distress from a bird. The girl scrambled up, looking around frantically._ _She ran to see some birds perched on a tree branch, they were observing some wolves who appeared to have been attacked._

 _She also noticed another wolf attacking what looked like a knight clad in armor, but it too fell, exhausted. She ran to the wolfs' side and watched the man collapse upon a tree._

 _She approached,_ _hovering over Garland anxiously and asked._

 _"Sir Knight, are you hurt? Are you...in pain?"_

 _He did not answer her, but gave a quiet groan._

 _"You are!" she noted sadly._

 _Again he said nothing, only shut his eyes agonizingly._

 _"I'll help! Here, listen!"_

 _As she began to play her lute Garland began to recover his strength, as did that of the wolves he'd just fought. However, instead of renewing the fight the beasts came to lay down beside the girl and rest. As tame as any loyal hound._

 _His eyes snapped open and he looked at her confused._

 _"You don't have to worry." she told him with a bright smile._

 _"You can stay here. For as long as you wish."_

 _"Do you mean that?" he asked quietly._

 _"Of course!" she replied with_ _a wide grin._

 _"This land belongs to all of us."_

As the memory began to fade into darkness, Garland looked upon the fair princess one last time. His hand moved to reach for her, as if to try and recapture that fleeing memory. A memory of what it felt like, to be needed, accepted...

He then faded into darkness, and vanished.

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 **Author's Notes:** Hello again my faithful readers. Hope you all enjoyed my latest story. As I'm certain you've already noticed, this is my first try and a true short-story. Hope I did alright. One reason I haven published any fanfics in a while was because I'd taken some time off to enjoy the Dissidia series (in case that wasn't obvious).

I'd never played many final fantasy games before (only 5, 10, and 11). But I was lucky enough to find Dissida and Dissida 012. In the end I decided I liked all the characters, but the ones that interested me the most were the Warrior of Light and his arch-foe Garland. And while the Warrior of Light's story was fleshed out, Garlands remained shrouded in mystery.

So I managed to get ahold of the original Final Fantasy. But I soon noticed Garlands backstory was still lacking. So then I shrugged and thought "why not put something together from what I already know?" And so I did, I know in the original game Garland makes his intention to marry Princess Sarah of Cornelia in a bid to take over her kingdom clear. But I thought it might be interesting if there was more to it than that. Like, she was the first person to treat him like fellow human being in a long time. It's all theory and conjecture of course, but I hope it also made an interesting story.

Once again I thank you all for reading my works. I hope you found this little short story worth the read.

Oh and incase your wondering, I chose the Behemoth as the villain in the backstory to acknowledge that the Behemoth was supposed to make it into the first Final Fantasy. Thought that'd make a nice cameo.


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